The civil Parish of St. Ives and St. Leonards, originally in Hampshire, became part of Dorset in 1974. The ecclesiastical parish was named “St. Ives and St. Leonards,” but the independent 1930 civil version reversed the order. This “mismatch” did not change until a new vicar was appointed in 1969 and plans for a replacement church were proposed, completed in 1972 with flat roofs.
This 1969 plan shows the area of the church parish under the new rules and indicates some areas beyond that are within the civil parish. Among the lay readers, Henry Barber stands out. A member of the build committee in 2011, he also served as churchwarden with William Bell, ran a Sunday School, kept the accounts, arranged and carried out fundraising, and in 1915 became Lay Reader in charge.
In 2008, I took several Canadian relatives on a long tour that included his room from 1918-22 at the Priory of St. Cross in Winchester. He had a friend in the now Bishop of Winchester, who had once been a vicar he had worked with in London. Files titled “A Tale of Two Churches” at the Meeting House are now being revised.
The ecclesiastical arrangement for our parish is not so unusual, as similar circumstances took place in the late nineteenth century. We once again have a vicar to serve our needs, but this time, the vicar also covers the parishes of Ringwood and Ellingham under this “benefice.”
The earliest records, based on copies of the magazine “Good News” from September, reminded me of research in 2005. These records were based on the 1996 book “A Vision of Faith” by the late David and Dorothy Clarke, funded in the late 1990s by an old parishioner who lived overseas. Long ago, a similar situation existed in our parish based on links with Christchurch Priory and its Parochia that extended as far as our AD45 “Roman Road line.” Many physical property boundaries on the ground survive today.
Late 19th-century curates and vicars from the Priory and Ringwood served the needs of the small population, who gathered in a field to worship with their own chairs. Today’s Boundary Lane once marked the limit of the 1725 Ringwood “Poor Law” district. The 1725 workhouse, later “Poor House,” still stands today as a private home on the Verwood Road.
By the time development of the western half of the St. Ives area began between today’s St. Ives End Lane and what later became Post Office Lane, the population increased. A Wesleyan chapel was built there, and further building occurred to the east of “Post Office Lane.” Lay Readers dealt with the routine outdoor services but were supported by local landowners in lobbying for a church to serve this “Conventional District.”
Half an acre of land from a four-acre “Villa” site from the Earl of Malmesbury’s Estate was donated via William Bell, of the St. Leonards Poultry Farm off Boundary Lane. Bell took on numerous unsold Malmesbury Estate properties in 1906. The plot was accepted by Christchurch as a site for the church.
Bell offered to provide customized blocks and other funding to build the church, designed by a local architect. The first “All Saints” church was completed and consecrated in November 2012 in the presence of numerous church dignitaries. The view below is dated circa 1914.
Article by John Hawkins
